Inventory management in storage facilities sometimes requires management of the temperature of the inventory, especially for perishable inventory like in the food industry. Other industries, such as pharmaceuticals and electronics, benefit from temperature management during storage. Various concerns exist for the design and function of the facility. Such concerns include avoidance of temperature gradients within the space, ease of access to the storage areas and inventory, and the density of the inventory in the facility.
Large refrigeration systems such as commercial food freezers and coolers, typically use cool air circulated around the boxes and crates of inventory to control the temperature, and the quality, of the inventory during storage. In some facilities in the past, the tops and side walls of the space were closely spaced to the inventory to get good circulation of cool air around the inventory, especially if the space had multiple stories or levels. Fans and ducting were also used to achieve desired airflows. This resulted in a cell-like structure to the site. Movement of inventory and workers was hindered by the use of the physical structures to control airflow.
In some facilities, a more open structure was used. Typically, the boxes were stored on pallets on racking, in a back-to-back manner. While these facilities were more open than the ones noted above, typically, these were less dense and used the space less efficiently than the closed room facility.
There is a need to have large open spaces to the inventory storage spaces. Such an arrangement would allow for more flexible inventory handling and distribution systems for loading and unloading in the space. However, the conditioned air must be distributed so all the inventory is maintained at an appropriate temperature. In addition, the density of the inventory storage is a concern to keep space needs to a minimum. There is an increasing demand for more efficient use of storage space. Improvements to temperature controlled storage facilities are desired.